


how to be happy (a valuable life lesson)

by levlinwinlaer



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Widowtracer, look i have too little patience for slowburn or angst, side pharmercy, strongly reciprocated feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-27
Updated: 2018-03-27
Packaged: 2019-04-08 17:49:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14110749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/levlinwinlaer/pseuds/levlinwinlaer
Summary: They're not dating.They're really not.semi-established widowtracer with a little actually-established side pharmercy. for @secretlyuniversallyruins for the 2018 overwatch femslash exchange.





	how to be happy (a valuable life lesson)

**Author's Note:**

> listen... i? gay.

They’re not dating.

They’re really not.

Just because Angela happened to be walking by the café where they go sometimes to get croissants and too-sweet coffee and it happened to be one of the warm Parisian days where having a friend (fuck buddy? acquaintance? mortal enemy?) whose skin is cold as ice is very useful to cuddle up against and so Lena had pressed her face into Widowmaker’s neck and Widow had decided, unexpectedly, to tolerate it for a few seconds longer than she would normally and Angela had come back early from her UN meeting and caught a glimpse of the two of them together and-

The second Angie knew, the world knew.

 

“You’re dating Widowmaker?”

Lena turns, very slowly, and makes a run for it.

Unfortunately, Fareeha knows her a little too well, and she’s held in place by two fingers curled into the back of her collar.

“You have _feelings_ for Widowmaker. Widowmaker!”

“We’re not dating,” Lena says, and while Fareeha gapes at her, tries to duck away. Fareeha combats this by lifting her directly in the air by the collar of her jacket.

“ _Widowmaker_.”

Lena gives up, crosses her arms defensively. “Yes, that’s her name. You’re right. Let me down, you big lug, I’ve got a mission.”

“Don’t call me that. Widowmaker, Lena! Widow! She kills people! She’s a bad person!”

“She’s not a bad person,” Lena argues, batting at Fareeha’s iron grip on her collar.

“Are you sure about that?”

“Yes! Put me down!”

“Not until you tell me why on earth you could think dating Widowmaker is a good idea.”

“We’re not dating, and it’s just like you and Angie!”

Fareeha gapes at her. “Me and Angela- what the hell do me and Angela have to do with you and Widowmaker!”

“You’re coworkers! You make it work!”

“The thing you don’t seem to be understanding is that you and Widowmaker are not coworkers,” Angela cuts in from the side of the room.

Fareeha nods in agreement, shaking Lena for emphasis. “She’s an assassin. She kills Overwatch soldiers on a routine basis.”

“Well, yeah, but-“

“No. This is not a ‘well, yeah, but’ affair. Dating Widowmaker! I can’t believe it.”

“We’re not dating.” Lena says petulantly.

Angela frowns, stepping forward. “Yes, you are.”

“Are not.”

“I saw the two of you all cuddled up in a café, sharing a croissant, with Edith Piaf playing in the background, and both of us know that Widowmaker doesn’t smile over anything. And-”

“Wait,” Lena says, an unreadable expression on her face. “She was smiling?”

Angela stares at her for a moment, before sighing out an “ah, Scheisse,” and tugging Fareeha down to whisper to her.

“She’s gone for her,” Angela murmurs. Fareeha tilts her head and gives her a questioning look.

“In love,” Angie clarifies. “She’s in love.”

“She’s also _right here_ ,” Lena says uncomfortably, squirming. “And she’d prefer if you two would stop discussing her feelings in front of her.”

“Mission departing in five minutes,” Winston says over the speakers. “Lena Oxton, that means you. Hana, put that-“ The mic cuts out abruptly.

“We’ll continue this chat later,” Angela says, reaching out to touch Lena’s cheek. “Tonight?”

“Er… about that.” Lena scratches her head and studiously avoids both their gazes. “I’m flying to Paris after this London mission. For, er, reasons.”

Fareeha makes a very pained noise. “Lena!”

“Sorry! I’m sorry. Well, I’m not, but-“

“Just- go.” Angela says, and Fareeha drops her. She doesn’t need any more encouragement.

“Hell,” Angie says, wrapping an absentminded arm around Fareeha’s waist and dropping a kiss onto her shoulder. “What are we going to do?”

“I don’t know.”

 

Amelie shifts in the too-small seat, her knees bumping into the underside of the table. The client’s lawyer reads off the terms in a high-pitched monotone, squirming away from her ever so slightly. She drums her fingers against the smooth linoleum, half-listening.

Abruptly, there’s a short buzz in her ear. Amelie holds up a finger at the lawyer. He stops his silly blathering for a moment, and she takes the reprieve to answer the call.

“Hiya, love,” chirps a familiar voice, car horns beeping in the background. Amelie lets out a breath, tilting the tiny chair onto its back legs.

“Lena,” she says. “You’re back already?”

“Yep.” A soft curse as a traffic omnic beeps angrily in the background. “Mission let out early, so I hitched a ride back on an early flight to Paris. Missed you.”

“I missed you as well.”

“Nice to hear it, darling.” The sound of fumbling for keys. “Did you get the biscuits?”

“Oui. Digestives, no?”

“You betcha. Hey, I think we might have run out of-“

“I ordered some milk this morning. The doorman should have it.”

“Lovely.” The doorman chirps out a muffled greeting in the background. “Hi, Danny! You’ve got the milk, I hear? Thank you, you’re a darling. Tell the hubby I said hi, and his scone recipe is absolutely gorgeous. Yes, you too. Have a wonderful evening.”

Amelie crosses one leg over the other and rubs her knuckles against her jaw absentmindedly. The background noises shift into quiet, Lena’s quiet breathing filtering over the line. “And the-“

“Earl Grey? Cabinet, upper left. I picked some up yesterday.”

“You know me so well, love.” Lena hums as she putters around the kitchen, tugging the Earl Grey down from the shelf. Amelie listens to the clinking and rustling and recognises the song. A Beatles tune, from the old, old days.

“Fuck, I’m buggered,” Lena says, half to herself, and stirs the tea. “Aren’t you a darling,” she croons to the teacup, “yes, you are.” A noisy sip echoes over the line, and then a sigh of bliss.

Amelie doesn’t know it, but she’s smiling, a soft upwards curl of the corner of her mouth. Wistful, yes, but not melancholy, like missing someone you know will be there when you come home.

“Hey, shit,” Lena says suddenly. Amelie blinks to attention, un-crossing her legs. “Aren’t you in some kind of meeting right now?”

“It’s not important,” Amelie says. It’s a lie, technically, and Lena knows it.

“Give ‘em hell, love,” she says. “See you at home?”

“See you at home.”

Amelie ends the call and looks up to find that the lawyer and the client are both watching her curiously. For the first time, the lawyer offers a tentative smile. Amelie doesn’t return it, but the glare has softened into something resembling a neutral expression.

“So the assassin has a soft side,” says the client, tapping a pen against his mouth.

Amelie laughs, a cold hard sound. “Not for you.”

She signs the contract with a purple flourish, and ducks out through the window as soon as they confirm the target.

 

Lena is half-dozing in their bed when she comes home, and she accepts the kiss Amelie places on her forehead with a sleepy grab at her face. Amelie slides in next to her, tugging the covers up, and wincing apologetically at Lena’s little shiver. It’s warm, dark, the bedroom fan buzzing quietly in the background.

“Hey,” Lena says groggily. Amelie ducks under her outstretched arm and shifts closer, pushing her nose into the warm pillow.

“ _Bonne nuit_ ,” she murmurs. “It has been a long few weeks.”

“Yeah, I know.” A quiet, comfortable pause, and then Lena turns over onto her other side and regards Amelie with a half-lidded stare.

“Are we dating?” she blurts out without thinking, and suddenly Amelie’s eyes fly open and they’re both suddenly wide awake.

“I…” Amelie begins, then drifts off. “I do not know. Are we?”

Lena’s eyes scan her face. “Well. Are you seeing other people?”

“No,” Amelie responds instantly. “And you?”

“No.”

“Good.”

“Still,” Lena says. “Do you want to- for us to be- a couple?”

“It’d be complicated,” Amelie hedges.

“That’s a no,” Lena says, shifting slightly away. Amelie frowns, reaches out to her in apology.

“Non, non. Not a ‘no’. I simply- do not know how it would work.”

“Well, love,” Lena says, a hesitant smile creeping onto her face, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we do share a flat.”

“We do.”

“And we take turns buying groceries.”

“ _Oui_ , and we go out to cafés and bicker about the heating and hold hands and- well.”

They regard each other for a moment in the moonlight, realisation dawning.

“Guess that’s an answer,” Lena says, and shuffles forward under the covers to kiss her. Amelie holds her there with a gentle grip on the back of her neck, and Lena gets the hint, tugging her in and deepening the kiss. Amelie sighs quietly, murmurs something that gets lost between their mouths, and pushes her into the mattress.

 

They’re curled up in the loveseat under the bay window with sunlight streaming in and wind ruffling Lena’s hair when Amelie says it.

Lena sets down a cup and saucer in front of her on the table (café au lait with the expensive grated chocolate that Lena buys from a tiny shop in Switzerland every month because Amelie loves it) and drops a kiss on the top of Amelie’s head, and Amelie says, absentmindedly and without looking up from her latest assassination contract, “ _Merci_. _Je t’aime_.”

“Anytime, love,” Lena says in response. There’s a beat of quiet, and then Amelie drops her contract and jerks upright.

“What is it?” Lena asks, alarmed.

“ _Je t’aime_ ,” Amelie repeats to herself, then looks up at Lena, and, with a growing smile on her face, says it again. “ _Je t’aime._ ”

“I love you too,” Lena says, wearing a matching smile. They’re both looking at each other from across the loveseat, grinning like idiots, and abruptly Amelie bats the textbook on theoretical physics out of Lena’s grasp and pins her to the loveseat.

 

Amelie leaves Talon in an enormous complicated mess of a mission led by none other than Angela, who reminds Lena multiple times and with increasing amounts of concern not to overreact or do anything stupid. (She does end up doing something stupid, because _of course_ , but it’s well worth it.) They wean her, slowly and steadily, off the Talon drugs, and after two years she can walk down the street and get nothing more than admiring looks. Amelie passes on most of the Overwatch missions, and turns instead (somewhat surprisingly) to teaching Overwatch recruits. She has an eye for scaring the newbies just enough to make them bend to her will.

 

Amelie comes as Lena’s date to Angela and Fareeha’s wedding (which really was just delaying the inevitable), and they slowdance to Elvis Presley after drinking too much champagne.

A week or so later, Amelie stops outside a jeweller’s and looks at the rings through the display window. She rushes away after a few moments, but she finds herself back there again, and again, and again.

Eventually, the jeweller, an old woman with deepset lines in her face, steps up to her and pokes her in the shoulder.

“Whoever it is the ring’s for,” she says, “hurry up and get it. Love is a good thing. No point in prolonging the wait.”

Amelie buys the ring, and prays Lena will say yes.

 

(She says yes.)

**Author's Note:**

> @overwatch-au on tumblr. also known as @dreamof1698. hmu lads and ladies and all


End file.
